Google Docs

[live4thebj]

Brief summary, several days ago I posted about a renaming issue with 365 on OneDrive using an Apple. I since then did as suggested and used Pages since I am fully embracing the Apple ecosystem. But I found it really lacked the grammar and spelling tools. It is okay at best but Word was far superior. Still I am cancelling my 365 because I migrated everything over to iCloud and don’t see the point.

With that said I then reviewed that post again and someone said Google Docs. First I have to thank that person, I personally found GD is far superior to Word. The grammar alone let alone the spellcheck is a lot better than Word.

Now the reason for this post. Any reason not to continue to use Google Docs?

 

[MrPixel]

Any reason not to continue to use Google Docs?

Absolutely. Because Google snoops around in your stuff, and they have a history of arbitrarily changing the TOS. All it takes is some anonymous manager to extend their "no pornography" rule to erotic text and your content vanishes.

Never upload your creative works to a cloud service without a local backup.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Absolutely. Because Google snoops around in your stuff, and they have a history of arbitrarily changing the TOS. All it takes is some anonymous manager to extend their "no pornography" rule to erotic text and your content vanishes.

Never upload your creative works to a cloud service without a local backup.

I use GD as a path of least resistance. But, yeah, what he said

 

[Writer61]

Absolutely. Because Google snoops around in your stuff, and they have a history of arbitrarily changing the TOS. All it takes is some anonymous manager to extend their "no pornography" rule to erotic text and your content vanishes.

At least use a secondary Google account that isn't linked to your primary account (if you have one).

I only use Google Drive when sharing a file with a beta reader, and delete the files when finished.

 

[GemmaGemmaGemma]

I also changed to google docs at the end of last year and it is really nice to use. I love the tabs for big series. I just go to my google drive after every writing session and download the document as a word document in case my account ever gets zapped.

 

[TheLobster]

At least use a secondary Google account that isn't linked to your primary account (if you have one).

But make sure you fill in the details like it’s a real person (I learned the hard way…).

 

[JohnBJohn]

I write in Docs, but to upload, I save the file locally and upload the local file. This way I have a copy of the finished story and I haven't had any problems with how the story looks. It's also easy to share with editors.

 

[ClintonBrooks]

Now the reason for this post. Any reason not to continue to use Google Docs?

Google has a lovely AI system that scrapes all the documents saved there. There is a woman on YouTube who says she found aspects of her stories, elsewhere. I haven't heard this myself, just from other folks.

There are a TON of video's about how people use the AI in Google to help them write their stories, and since I'm against AI, fuck Google.

I use (the free version) of Ellipsus. It's cloud based, so I can access it on my laptop or my Kindle (which is nice at night when I think of things, so I no longer have to text them to myself to copy over the next day.)
Ellipsus has an anti-AI policy.

Like Google Docs, Ellipsus allows you to have collaborators...so you can use that to have beta-readers who can comment on specific portions of your work, or even co-write with someone else should you want to do that.

 

[Nynah]

I use (the free version) of Ellipsus. It's cloud based, so I can access it on my laptop or my Kindle (which is nice at night when I think of things, so I no longer have to text them to myself to copy over the next day.)
Ellipsus has an anti-AI policy.

Like Google Docs, Ellipsus allows you to have collaborators...so you can use that to have beta-readers who can comment on specific portions of your work, or even co-write with someone else should you want to do that.

This is the way. I have the paid version of Ellipsus and it's worth every bit. They're anti-AI so there's no chance anything I put in there gets scraped.

I still maintain a Google account for collaboration and email but there's no reason not to use Ellipsus if you value your work and your privacy. Google Docs was the gold standard for a long time, but with them sliding even further into AI slopification, I'm not going to make it easy for them to steal my work.

 

[BladeSeanchai]

This is actually eye opening. I wrote and store everything in GD. To date, I have not had issues and was not aware of the “disgruntled manager” zapping all of my content.
When I retired I closed my MS account not needing it any longer. I’ll look into Ellipsus thanks for calling out this as an alternative

 

[ColtonWrites]

I love Ellipsus.
There's also a new one coming out at the end of the month called Interrobang that I want to check out.

 

[JohnBJohn]

The only issue with smaller, 3rd party web apps is that they could fold at any time and if they do not warn you (most would), you could lose everything if they shut down their servers. The key point is, no matter what service you use, back up locally!

I always save my finished story to my local drive as a MS Word docx file, right before I upload it. This way I have it forever (gotta back up the local drive too.)